TRPG General Chat

12:02 AM

The big thing, as always, is that something like Ki Khanga can get other people saying "I can do that better!"

12:44 AM

@Adeptus I had one of these in the playground in my hometown. It was terrible. You could climb up, sit in a hot metal shell, with a huge plastic window, for roughly 30 seconds, before needing to leave again.

BESW

12:56 AM

It wouldn't be hard to put some ventilation in the nose cone without letting rain and snow inside.

Playground equipment designers do not impress me.

trogdor

It does seem age-ist in a way

Ben

@BESW Nowadays, with all the hoops they need to jump through (badum-tss) to appease parents that insist a child should not run anywhere without full body armour, I think they do ok.

trogdor

No one whose oppinion matters is expected to use the equipment they make

@Ben parents are stupid sometimes for sure

At least collectively

Ben

They had a rope tower on the beach a few years back. I loved that thing (and I was in my early 20's at that time). The rope was coarse and stiff, the gaps were huge, and the first level was a good metre off the ground, but it was still removed because it was "unsafe for young children to climb on"

trogdor

No insult intended to individual parents

Ben

1:02 AM

@trogdor Haha I know what you mean.

Wear your seatbelt, don't run with scissors, but if you fall, after I told you to be careful, because you will fall, after countless and incessant attempts to allow stupid behaviour - that's on you.

(I will still come to their aid - but don't expect me to be sorry about it)

@BESW On the other hand, I do remember one particular playground that had a metal slide. In the middle of the sunlit playground.

BESW

Yeah, there's just a certain amount of "Maybe give the kids some airholes" type considerations that never seem to get taken into account.

Ben

Kids still used it. Maybe not more than once, without a 10 minute run around the playground to let their backside cool off... Sure, might be poor desing by the designers, but kids still used it, and they loved irt

Miniman

@Ben The best playground I'd ever seen was torn down and replaced with the usual generic stuff, strictly and solely because it was made of wood.

BESW

And I grew up on a tropical island, and most of our playground equipment was for temperate climates.

Miniman

Because, you know, wood is an inherently unsafe material.

Ben

1:06 AM

@Miniman YES. This has happened constantly around me

BESW

@Miniman Alan Scott agrees.

Miniman

I'm also seeing a lot of tambark replaced with weird spongy plastic - having fallen on both, I really think someone has this "upgrade" backwards.

Ben

@BESW Though perhaps it was all a clever ploy to help the parenting practice of "wear out your child"

BESW

Then I posit there's an important difference between "exhaustion" and "heat stroke."

Ben

Good counterpoint haha

BESW

1:13 AM

@Miniman I never had tanbark growing up. I had... sand, or grass on rocks.

Miniman

@BESW Sand is pretty great. Grass on rocks...yikes.

BESW

Sand fleas are not great. Neither are cans and bottles hidden in sand.

Wet pour rubber wasn't a lot better, though. Algae made it slippery, sun made it deteriorate, and OMG that stuff gets hot in the sun.

Miniman

@BESW Well, yeah. Every playground needs maintenance to stay usable.

BESW

Ours tended not to get that.

trogdor

We lack maintenance on a lot of things

I mean, we have had power generators literally explode

BESW

1:17 AM

Our mass transit system was recently trashed because the contract for buses failed to include provisions for maintenance.

trogdor

Mmm mm maintenance

Ben

@BESW Having experienced all of this as a child, I can say that some things are experiences that are enough to make you careful

And sand fleas are more of an annoyance than anything

I was galloping around barefoot, and there was a broken bottle in the grass - landed dead on it, cut my foot pretty damn deep.

I wore shoes after that

BESW

Sometimes it's a matter of quantity.

Adeptus

@Miniman There's a great playground at St Kilda (in Adelaide, not the Melbourne one). I haven't been there for years, but it had massive metal slides, all sorts of weird see-saws, a wooden fort & pirate ship. Might have been a maze as well? I think it partly burnt down a while ago, but got rebuilt.

BESW

And sometimes it's a matter of resources and culture.

Miniman

1:21 AM

@Adeptus The one I was talking about was a big wooden two-level maze, it was great.

Ben

There are definitely two perspectives I'm seeing here though: the child's perspective, and the adult's/parent's perspective.

In all honestly, these connect-it plastic "out-of-the-box" style playground equipment sets seem to be just as popular with kids nowadays as our own playgrounds were

Adeptus

I just looked it up. They've changed most of it! Noooo!

Miniman

@Ben Well, that's what they've got.

Ben

Yeah. I mean, if you present a child with something else, they're going to make a choice either way. Usually "bigger is better", or something like a pirate ship-style playground to help incite their imagination.

But they're not complaining now :)

Ben

2:31 AM

@Miniman in case you were interested, I think I've come to the conclusion about the Heroes of Diablo 1, and their experience with Demons. It could go either way

Miniman

@Ben See, what makes it even weirder is that, as we spread out from Tristram in D2 and D3, it really does seem like there are demons everywhere in Sanctuary.

Or in some cases, I guess, the local wildlife is basically demon-equivalent.

Ben

@Miniman Well, after D1, the Dark wanderer was effectively Diablo, Mephisto was released as well, and then Baal destroyed the Worldstone. So that makes sense.

@Miniman yeah, especially in D2

Miniman

@Ben Well, yeah. But Mephisto was no more released in D2 than he was in D1.

(Everyone forgets that it was Mephisto who freed Diablo, and by extension Baal, not the other way around.)

Ben

@Miniman I mean, yeah... effectively the Zakarum were serving him.

Miniman

It's one of the things that makes the plot of D3 so silly - "it was all Diablo's plan all along" really just doesn't work.

The main one, of course, is that Adria tells you "the Evils weren't destroyed when the soulstones were because of the Black Soulstone, so let's gather all of them into the Black Soulstone and then destroy it, and that will destroy them". There's enough holes in that to play holier-than-thou with Imperius.

Ben

2:47 AM

I think there is some confusion happening here...

Mephisto was able to corrupt the Zakarum, through his soulstone. The soulstones only imprisoned the souls of the Prime evils, not seal them off completely.

Miniman

Yep, which allowed him to take control of Kurast, and send Lazarus to free Diablo.

Ben

The corruption of the Zakarum states that Diablo and Baal were the ones that freed Mephisto, after Diablo was freed by Lazarus

Miniman

@Ben "Freed Mephisto" - from what? Before they got there, he was imprisoned in the Durance of Hate by the Compelling Orb, but nonetheless in full control of Kurast. After they visited him, his situation was exactly the same.

I guess they opened the portal to Hell together, so he was freed in the sense that he could leave Sanctuary if he wanted to, but he clearly didn't want to, because he didn't leave.

Oops, I'm wrong. The Compelling Orb wasn't imprisoning him at all, it was a device created by the corrupted High Council to hide the Durance.

So...yeah.

Ben

@Miniman From the soulstone - by giving him a host, similar to Baal (Tla Rasha) and Diablo (Aidan)

That's my interpretation

Miniman

@Ben He took Sankekur's body long before the others got there, though.

Ben

2:58 AM

Hmmmm

> Thus, Diablo arrived in the form of the Dark Wanderer, with Baal at his side. The two entered the temple's innermost chamber where Mephisto's soulstone was kept, and released him. Mephisto possessed Sankekur (already under Mephisto's control),

Miniman

Iiiiiiinteresting.

Ben

So not quite. Sankekur had been corrupted by Mephisto, yes; but his body was still his own, even if his mind wasn't

So Mephisto had prepared his vessel already, so when he did gain control of it, he just flipped a switch a [pop] took on his own visage. Diablo, on the other hand, had a more brute force approach, since he only started taking over Aidan once he had driven the soulstone into his own body.

Miniman

See, that just seems bizarre - Mephisto had total control over the High Council, and even had them shatter his soulstone into seven shards - then he just sat there in the stone shards, not taking a body, until his brothers arrived?

Not saying you're wrong, just that it's weird.

Ben

That is inconsistent. Yes.

Miniman

In any case, I think it's clear that Mephisto deserves all the credit Diablo has been hogging for the events of D1 and D2.

Ben

3:05 AM

I was going to say - I don't think so.

Miniman

Oh?

Even if he was still "imprisoned" when the brothers showed up, the fact is that he was responsible for Diablo's release.

Ben

I remember seeing somewhere that Mephisto was only interested in taking over Sanctuary - therefore Baal can't take credit for his own plan - it was what Mephisto wanted to do (but couldn't obviously). Perhaps because Mephisto's souls tone had been shattered, and while strong enough to seal him back in it temporarily until it was destroyed on the Soulforge, not strong enough to help corrupt the worldstone

Diablo on the other hand - saw beyond that.

Miniman

@Ben To the events of D3, you mean?

Ben

Yes

So Mephisto only wanted to control Sanctuary, with Diablo and Baal.

Miniman

Well, I quite specifically said that Mephisto deserves all the credit Diablo has been hogging for the events of D1 and D2.

Ben

3:08 AM

Diablo wanted to go bigger and badder - become the Prime Evil

@Miniman Ah right

True...

Perhaps it's just bad foresight then. You know, a game that kicks off and the lore is built after the universe is established.

Miniman

@Ben Also, even if you accept that the D3 plan was in place the whole time, I think it has to have been Adria's plan, rather than Diablo's.

Ben

Plus... I don't think a game called "Mephisto" would quite have the same ring to it

Miniman

@Ben Well, that's definitely true :)

Ben

@Miniman Adria was in league with Lazarus... wasn't she?

Miniman

@Ben But as long as Blizzard try to pretend it's consistent and planned, I get to criticize their inconsistency and lack of planning.

Ben

3:12 AM

Well, not in league... but she was sort of aiming for the same thing, for different reasons - she wanted to help Diablo

@Miniman Hahaha

> Aidan had plunged Diablo's soulstone into his forehead in an attempt to contain Diablo's essence, and Adria beheld that essence within him. When Aidan spoke, she heard thousands of voices, and saw the flames of her past. Thus, Adria knew fear. Thus, she pledged herself to Diablo's service

Only after Diablo's "defeat" in D1 did she become Diablo's servant

Before that, she was only attracted to power

And there was definitely power in Tristram at the time

Miniman

@Ben I'm not sure the scare marks are really needed - Diablo was defeated. It was a win for Diablo only because Aidan picked the dumbest method of re-imprisoning him imaginable.

So I guess Aidan should be the one to get the credit for the events of D2 :D

Ben

@Miniman Well Aidan was convinced to do so.

After seeing his brother being the previous host, having done the exact same thing, after being kidnapped by Lazarus...

Either Aidan was missing a lot of screws, or the voices in his head (that also affected Blood Raven and the Summoner), drove him to do so...

Miniman

3:28 AM

Fair - I guess everyone who fought Diablo ended up corrupted.

Which makes it even weirder that the heroes of D2 went everywhere, did everything, carried the soulstones around for ages, and all kinds of stuff without being corrupted.

Ben

You gotta admit, for a story that was written after the game came out, it's not a bad attempt haha

@Miniman That's because their powers as Nephalem began to come back, no?

Over time the power of the Worldstone wavered over the Nephalem

Miniman

@Ben I guess so - the events of D3 make it seem like any human who gets powerful enough is automatically Nephalized.

trogdor

This discussion makes me happy I never got invested in Diablo's story

It sounds like it has several of the same problems WoW did

Miniman

@trogdor I was never really invested until D3 started shoving its ridiculousness in my face.

trogdor

Lol

I didn't mean I thought you were

Just that if I had been it sounds like it would have been disappointing

Shalvenay

3:40 AM

hey there @trogdor and @nitsua60

trogdor

Hi

Miniman

Well, the main problem is that they locked themselves into a corner at the end of D2. Defeating the Prime Evils and destroying the Worldstone basically made escalation impossible for a sequel.

trogdor

Blizzard seems to have a bad habit of changing things later and claiming it was the plan all along

Shalvenay

@trogdor -- what you've said so far about your char's backstory has me kinda wondering what direction they'd be approaching the port city from, perhaps? or is that TBD?

Miniman

@trogdor That, too.

trogdor

3:42 AM

@Shalvenay I have no idea XD

@Miniman I kinda like some of their games, StarCraft for example

But boy are the stories in all of them really same-ey and overdone

Miniman

@trogdor I like a lot of their games! But I still recognise the flaws in those games.

trogdor

Yes they make good games

I don't personally like all of them but yeah they have definite flaws

@Shalvenay normally I would be all over questions like this but,... I have no knowledge of the setting

Shalvenay

@trogdor ah, I think we might have to talk about that next session, or perhaps we could bounce it off of @nitsua60 beforehand even?

trogdor

I am fine with either of those ideas

He did say he wanted to add some things about why I went to Chult

@Miniman I have played some occasional Heroes of the Storm, and strangely enough my probably favorite character is from Diablo

Ben

@Miniman @Trogdor I fail to see what "ridiculousness" of D3 or the "corners" in D2?

trogdor

3:58 AM

I have no idea, it just sounds like the story in the game has taken the usual Blizzard turn

Over complication and ret coning of important details

nitsua60

@trogdor So not so much about why you went to Chult, but I'm hoping you don't mind if I build off of your reason a bit. Basically, of the group of people you were most-recently working with, maybe one has a cousin in the city (Port Nyanzaru) who needs some help?

trogdor

I don't think that makes the game bad

@nitsua60 ok fair enough

Ben

@trogdor Personally I don't see it. Yeah, they often come to "the end" of the story, then they start off the next part of the story, using the gaps in the previous story to build a new one.

nitsua60

Hoping to get handouts polished off tomorrow. It's the sort of thing that'll only take half an hour, but finding half an hour this week has been beastly. And the next two days don't look any better =\

trogdor

If anything it is more of a lament about Blizzard rather than Diablo

@Ben and that is fine, you can like that

I just don't like that they use that technique a lot

Shalvenay

4:01 AM

@nitsua60 yeah, I was kind of wondering about the geography of Trog's Chultan pilgrimage :) my mental picture has my char coming to Port Nyanzaru from the south-ish, Trog's char coming to Port Nyanzaru from the north-ish, and then ofc Korv's char arriving by boat

does that kinda make sense, or is my mental picture off-track @nitsua60?

Ben

@trogdor I can see that it's a bit exploitative, sure. Resurrecting something that "finished" because there's a big enough gap to do so

trogdor

@Ben yes, and honestly it wouldn't bother me so much if they didn't do it every chance they got with every game they could

Ben

Sorry if I'm coming acorss a bit defensive

trogdor

No no problem

I also don't want you to think I think you shouldn't like Diablo

nitsua60

Okay, vague lay of the land. Port Nyanzaru sits on the north point of a small peninsula that juts into the (large) Bay of Chult, which itself is on the northern coast of Chult. The bay is guarded to the west by a mountain chain that runs up the west coast of Chult, and some small mining communities pepper the area. Up the east coast of the Bay of Chult there's a military outpost and some small communities around there.
Heading east or south or southwest from the Bay puts one into deep, deep, undead-infested jungle.

Ben

4:08 AM

@trogdor Nah :) All good

trogdor

I just have some issues with Blizzard as a company

nitsua60

Night, all!

Ben

@nitsua60 Hi!

@nitsua60 Bye!

nitsua60

@Ben You have a newish daughter, no?

Ben

@trogdor Call me ignorant, but I never bother with that. I enjoy the game, not the developer. Haha

@nitsua60 Turning 1 in a week... if that still counts, yes?

trogdor

4:09 AM

@Ben I just can't help it

nitsua60

@Ben Sure. How's everything going? Steps yet?

trogdor

Especially after WoW and StarCraft had basically the same story arc at one point

Ben

@nitsua60 Assisted :) She's standing on her own (leaning up against things)

And she knows "where's my nose" and "clap hands"

Shalvenay

@nitsua60 so do we want to go over this a bit more later on? (while my character might be coming up from inside the jungle, I suspect Trog's char would be more along the coastal regions)

nitsua60

@Ben Cool. It goes fast, man. It's been nine years, but I remember the first steps my son took like it was yesterday.

Ben

4:12 AM

@nitsua60 I am looking forward to it :D

nitsua60

@Shalvenay yeah--I gotta head out. But I get distracted by babies =)

Ben

Haha

Shalvenay

@trogdor -- given the lay of the land Nits gave, is my line of thinking that your char would probably be working up either the east or the west coast of Chult correct?

Adeptus

@trogdor The only Blizzard game that I play these days, doesn't have a story as such, just a backstory. (Overwatch)

Ben

@trogdor Pathfinder/Starfinder?

trogdor

4:13 AM

@Adeptus this is also fair

I like Overwatch backstory stuff

Very cool videos that can be watched standalone

Not necessarily the kind of game I am looking for right now though

Way too much time sensitive action in a 3D space XD

Adeptus

Because in-game, the "story" is "you and a small team of your allies & mortal enemies, are trying to (control a strategic point / escort a vehicle / stop the opposition escorting a vehicle / capture the opposition's flag) while opposed by a small team of your allies & mortal enemies, possibly including yourself"

Shalvenay

@trogdor -- did you catch what I said re: your char's pilgrimage/quest?

Adeptus

Some of their event game-modes have an internally-consistent story, but they ignore the whole backstory. eg, Revenge of Dr Junkenstein (at halloween), Yeti Hunt (at winter event)

BESW

No! No! No, no, no. Ki Khanga, that is a TERRIBLE initiative system. deadEarth does initiative better than you.

> If you play a [Suit other than Clubs], divide the card's face value by 3, rounded down, and then add it to your Total.

Ben

@BESW Why 3?

Shalvenay

4:25 AM

@BESW LOL! Ki Khanga init ~ D&D 3.5e Truenamer?

BESW

@Ben I DO NOT KNOW AND I AM NOT CARING SO RAPIDLY I MAY SUFFER ACCELERATION INJURIES.

Shalvenay

@BESW as long as you aren't the next Col. Stapp, I think we'll be fine?

Ben

I was going to ask more questions, but this is too far out of context for me to grasp, and following your previous posts about the game, I'll just take you at your word haha

BESW

@Shalvenay I am now Col. Stahp.

Shalvenay

@BESW that is...sooooo bad :P

hey there btw @SoraTamashii

trogdor

4:39 AM

@Shalvenay which was it?

Shalvenay

26 mins ago, by Shalvenay

@trogdor -- given the lay of the land Nits gave, is my line of thinking that your char would probably be working up either the east or the west coast of Chult correct?

re: lay of the land btw:

32 mins ago, by nitsua60

Okay, vague lay of the land. Port Nyanzaru sits on the north point of a small peninsula that juts into the (large) Bay of Chult, which itself is on the northern coast of Chult. The bay is guarded to the west by a mountain chain that runs up the west coast of Chult, and some small mining communities pepper the area. Up the east coast of the Bay of Chult there's a military outpost and some small communities around there.
Heading east or south or southwest from the Bay puts one into deep, deep, undead-infested jungle.

trogdor

Ah ok yes I saw that

Ben

5:02 AM

So my friend works at a tobacconist. They recently received a gift card from the Tobacco rep, for doing such a good sales job.

I assumed this was for tobacco products.

Turns out it was one of those "anywhere" gift cards - supermarket, game store, gas station, etc.

I'm not even sure there is such a thing as a gift cards for tobacco products.

So that's a derp.

Ben

6:11 AM

So... strange happenings...

Our patch panel (network switch) causes all sorts of weird networking issues when it loses power.

The network printer can only be fixed by switching ports

And our server, that hosts 2 virtual servers needs to be reset to regain connectivity.

trogdor

huh

Ben

6:37 AM

...I suppose it does make some sense... since technically, the host server isn't a part of the network - therefore its IP isn't part of the domain.

Maybe?

@BESW this Ki Khanga game isn't coming across very strong

BESW

No, which is a shame. The setting's actually got cool stuff and the mechanics have some solid ideas.

trogdor

I know you were very excited for it

sorry it didn't work out so well

BESW

But it's mechanically inconsistent and the presentation is horrible.

So, I'm hacking it.

trogdor

hack it up

BESW

If all goes well, this weekend we'll be playing as were-dolphin oracles, were-orca warriors, and psionic were-ocotopuses: the monstrous wardens of monsters, hunting god-addled mutants in a ship made of dragon bones and taking them back to our forbidden islands.

Ben

6:46 AM

@BESW I see the dilemma

That sounds awesome!

trogdor

@BESW that is pretty fast

BESW

@trogdor I don't have to invent new mechanics, just scoop out the useless bits and replace them with simplified stuff from other systems we already know.

trogdor

fair enough

and here I was thinking I would suggest like, a GSS game or a roll for shoes or something

Ben

> The moon passed between Nasa's Deep Space Climate Observatory and the Earth, allowing the satellite to capture this rare image of the moon's far side in full sunlight.

trogdor

oooh

cool

Ben

6:57 AM

trogdor

lol

of course

BESW

7:21 AM

@trogdor If you've got a GSS you'd like to run...

trogdor

I have an idea

it would be pretty simple but it exists

I am also open to it either being a continuation of our first game or just a whole new one

depends what you all want

I do really like running GSS so far

still up for something else too though, not picky about it

BESW

Solanum incompletum is a critically endangered flowering plant with red thorns & white flowers.

Tweeted by NaturelsWeird on February 21, 2018 at 5:55 PM

I recently tweeted about the importance of streaming and actual play online in modern tabletop publishing. I’ve snapshot and slightly expanded upon that thread over on Deadly Fredly: http://www.deadlyfredly.com/2018/02/the-importance-of-streaming-and-actual-play-online-in-modern-tabletop-publishing/

Tweeted by fredhicks on February 21, 2018 at 6:05 PM

trogdor

@BESW oh good lord

what is that monster

BESW

That night, evolution was a mean drunk.

Hmm. Having some trouble finding were-octopus images.

Don't wanna just re-color some illithid sprites.

trogdor

7:41 AM

lol

kviiri

@Ben Wikipedia has an animated version! upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/…

Ben

@kviiri Oohhh

kviiri

8:10 AM

I've been playing a lot of KSP on my spare time lately, all this space stuff has really started to interest me

(about time because I've been going steady with an astronomer for three and a half years!)

BESW

9:08 AM

@trogdor I'll see if I can put this thing together. It's a lot of fun but very experimental, and a sort of Franken-system.

Replacing skills with a variation on 13th Age style backgrounds.

BESW

10:07 AM

GAMERS: Do you buy players guides for RPGs that you play? Books that just have player-centered content (as opposed to actual core books like the DND Players Handbook)? Poll.

Tweeted by boymonster on February 21, 2018 at 10:21 PM

trogdor

@BESW ok

BESW

10:22 AM

Somebody called Ursula Vernon an embarrassment to "your parents, family, and all women." So now this is happening:

@evilrooster @Halftongue @UrsulaV @sigridellis @tithenai I’m thinking that Her Disgrace needs a order of Disgraced Paladins. Sort of the Paladin version of the Island of Misfit Toys… here, you can serve in your disgrace, because your disgrace is of no great consequence to Her.

Tweeted by wombatoverlord on February 21, 2018 at 10:07 PM in reply to wombatoverlord

@wombatoverlord @UrsulaV @evilrooster @Halftongue @sigridellis @tithenai

Tweeted by dduane on February 21, 2018 at 11:44 PM in reply to wombatoverlord

kviiri

@BESW Whatever did she do to "deserve" that

BESW

Trolling a troll, basically.

kviiri

Well, that's what happens, yep

:(

BESW

She's hilarious though. "Hot damn! I leveled up. I used to just be an embarrassment to my family!"

trogdor

internet trolls deserve to see you not giving half a #$#%&#$ about what they just said XD

eimyr

10:46 AM

@BESW So Ki Khanga has a regular deck of cards as randomizer? Dislike.

But it plays blackjack with it? Like.

BESW

...there's a deck you can buy with setting art if you want.

eimyr

has a deck with numbers and suits -> dislike

BESW

I'm excited to try it? I've never played an RPG that uses playing cards as the randomizer.

But first I'm aggressively hacking it.

Because it makes no sense.

eimyr

Isn't hacking a game you didn't play as written a sign of ~~phenomenal cosmic power~~ arrogance?

trogdor

no

not if they wrote it in a ridiculously nonsensical way

kviiri

10:50 AM

I like playing cards as a bit of a probability geek. Dice have a boring way of having no memory.

BESW

Since this thing doesn't even tell me how to deal damage, or what to do with cards after a turn, it's kinda unplayable as written?

eimyr

oh the joy of kickstarters

I'm suprised, if that's the case, you're even paying attention to it.

BESW

Also almost all of the mechanics that aren't directly attached to the card mechanic are just uninventive ports of the most boring parts of GURPS and D&D.

trogdor

@kviiri see, I don't know if I like the idea of the memory

BESW

I really wanted to like it, and the setting's got potential even if the game's not written to take advantage of that.

trogdor

10:53 AM

but I have not tried it so maybe it will be fine?

BESW

And the core mechanic has potential. I'm just hacking out all the D&Disms and shoving in some Cortex/Fate/13th Age replacements.

kviiri

@trogdor Well I don't think it's a "like it or hate it" thing. It's not like everything should have memory.

trogdor

but like, the cards will "remember"

and I don't know if I can like that as much as dice

BESW

I think there's some good value in memory for, for example, controlling the pacing of an adventure.

But I have no idea if Ki Khanga's trying to do that or not.

BECAUSE IT WON'T TELL ME.

eimyr

What is Ki Khanga supposed to be about?

kviiri

11:03 AM

Way back I thought of a scheme for various DnD-style "encounter paths", eg. for traveling in a wilderness with some random encounters. I'd have a deck of cards with the spades and hearts removed. For extra risks the players take when planning their trip, I'd add spades into the deck, and for good preparations like asking around for the safety of various routes or hiring a scout to probe the terrain before the main party, I'd add hearts.

Then I'd just draw n cards with n depending on how much stuff I wanted. Black cards are bad stuff (with spades specifically caused by risks taken, when applicable) and red cards are good stuff (again, with hearts preferably meaning something gained through careful planning).

BESW

@eimyr Again, I'm not sure. Its major selling point is the setting, but the game has very little to say about what you're expected to do in the setting.

kviiri

Never wound up actually using them because I think something like that would work better in a game where travel is a big part of the adventure, and I don't really do that myself.

eimyr

oh

BESW

Reading into the mechanics and example adventure, it looks like it's assuming a pretty standard OSR wandering-mercenaries type scenario.

A bit of city RP, a bit of travel resource management, some random encounters, and a lot of "here's a plot hook, someone wants you to go do a thing."

kviiri

Lately I've been interested in playing a resource management game... the problem is I'd like it separate from the freeformier bits of DnD.

BESW

11:11 AM

But I'm digging into the setting backstory and grabbing onto the awesome concept of oracular were-dolphins, were-orca warriors, and psionic were-octopuses, who keep god-addled monsters on their forbidden islands and sail out into the world on ships made from the bones of extinct dragons to hunt other monsters and bring them back to their islands, while warring with any outsiders who might want to control those monsters themselves.

trogdor

why do they keep those monsters alive?

BESW

Partly out of a sense of kinship, because they're monsters themselves created by the same divine apocalypse.

Partly because the goddess told them to.

trogdor

ah

kviiri

it... sounds like a terrible game with a potentially cool setting.

Mixed up my words for a bit.

BESW

Pretty much, yes.

kviiri

11:14 AM

A bit like I found Deadlands:Reloaded.

BESW

Though even then, the setting descriptions seem to miss out on what makes for awesome gameplay.

13 hours ago, by BESW

Half the book is dedicated to the setting. I can look up the major imports and exports of each nation, and how many soldiers are in their standing army, but it doesn't have any bits that talk about what sorts of adventures one might have there, or how an adventurer might even relate to it. Just border policies about registering magic weapons.

trogdor

sheesh

BESW

There's good stuff in there, it's just buried and scattered.

trogdor

I mean yeah that kind of detail is cool but not if you omit some basic stuff

BESW

And did I mention it doesn't have an index?

in Not a bar, but plays one on TV, Dec 20 '17 at 0:16, by trogdor

This is not how you this!!!

kviiri

11:18 AM

@BESW That reminds me of when my Deadlands: Reloaded character became a Texas Ranger and our GM gave me one of the old Deadlands Classic books, the Texas Ranger Bible or something. It was a cool read in a sense but left me with a profound sense of wonder regarding however I was supposed to make a working gameplay out of this.

trogdor

@BESW oh how embarrassing XD

kviiri

Eg. the book details how new recruits to Texas Rangers (who, in DL verse, are Confederacy's elite solider/secret police/monster hunter unit) mostly do latrine duty and exercising at their home garrison. Okay, I can see that happening as a prelude to a more adventurous campaign... if everyone plays a Texas Ranger.

BESW

Yaaarp.

The DnDoggos TeePublic shop is on sale starting today! Shirts, mugs, notebooks, and more! Lots of great doggos loot for under $20. Now is a great time to snag a few goodies! https://www.teepublic.com/stores/dndoggos?ref_id=5400

Tweeted by dndoggos on February 21, 2018 at 5:30 PM

trogdor

well also, even then that sounds boring

compared to like,... saying "ok you guys have your first mission after being new recruits for a while"

kviiri

Not only that, you have to actually buy the Edge in addition to completing the basic training, in-universe.

trogdor

11:23 AM

why do we even care what boring latrine duty you had when we are looking to go on an adventure?

kviiri

Oh, and promotions are also edges needing to be bought separately I see

BESW

Mechanics for the mechanic god!

[rips out eleven different D&D-like attributes, replaces with Ki Khanga's own four discipline categories]

[sets fire to more than 50 skills, plants Dresden Files Accelerated approaches in the ashy ground]

[surgically excises feats and spells, watches hole close up like it was never there]

BESW

11:42 AM

[shoves weapon and armor tables off a cliff]

[doesn't wait to see them hit the bottom]

[squint] "For your convenience, we have included a list of names for male and female characters in the index."

eimyr

the mythical index?

BESW

[flips to back of book]
[flips to table of contents]
[flips to back of book again]
YOU LIE.

There IS a list of names at the back of the book. It's the Kickstarter acknowledgements.

I don't think Lars Larsen is supposed to be a Ki Khanga name, though.

kviiri

12:06 PM

@BESW Your latest Ki Khanga question made me snicker.

BESW

Oh?

kviiri

It's a good question, just that it somehow punctuates your earlier questions so well :)

trogdor

wait, good things and bad things both draw you extra cards,.....

who designed this? whooooooooo

BESW

yeeeeah.

@kviiri [sigh]

kviiri

Have you contact with anyone else who ordered a book, or maybe the authors? They could possibly know about this

BESW

12:17 PM

I could contact the authors through the usual channels.

kviiri

By your description, it screams "beta" :<

trogdor

it has so many,... strange design problems

Adeptus

Guys... Check out next week's Librarians...

trogdor

lol

Adeptus

IT'S D&D AND JEFF!

BESW

12:25 PM

Jan 26 at 5:38, by BESW

Adeptus

Aw, beaten to it by BESW. By a few weeks...

trogdor

12:49 PM

lol

it's ok, happens to the best of us

kviiri

Happens to the besw of us!

3

SPavel

1:31 PM

what is a Librarians

BESW

The Librarian (franchise)

The Librarian is a series of made-for-TV original fantasy-adventure movies from Turner Network Television, starring Noah Wyle as The Librarian who protects a secret collection of artifacts. == Development == Dean Devlin, through his production company Electric Entertainment, brought David Titcher's original pitch to TNT. David Titcher wrote and created the original movie that sequels were based on. The director of the first film was Peter Winther, and writer/creator David Titcher co-produced with Marc Roskin and Kearie Peak. In 2004, they planned to produce three Librarian films with ER star Wyle...

SPavel

Interesting

BESW

[perusing DTRPG]
"The adventure can be used as an introductory adventure for new players, and is easily transferable for any D&D system."
[moves on quickly]

KorvinStarmast

@nitsua60 are older maps of FR an OK reference? 2e or 3e era. Some of the old, old maps show Chult connected to FR, and some show a split between SE chult and the adjoining area on the continent. the 3e era map has the 3 or 4 major towns shown ... not spoilery I think. Am studiuosly avoiding ToA pictures and spoilers ...

nitsua60

@KorvinStarmast should be fine. And I, personally, wouldn't care if you looked at full maps and dealt with the info-split between you and your character yourself, I just wanted to let you know to be careful if that were something you'd want to avoid. (cc: @trogdor @Shalvenay)

KorvinStarmast

1:47 PM

@nitsua60 I do, I would rather that the passage from Amn to Chult be symbolic of leaving the known for the unknown ... with a longer term goal of returning home once the trouble has died down, and with useful news of what the heck's going on in Chult.

BESW

Dungeons with Dragons: A Lasers & Feelings hack

SPavel

Dungeons with Dragoons: You play as former mounted infantry in 1815, languishing in prison after Napoleon's defeat. Can you escape the dungeon in time to change the outcome of Waterloo?

goodguy5

morning nerds

SPavel

Be the carefree capybara being attended to by a team of squirrel monkeys you want to see in the world.

Tweeted by DickKingSmith on February 20, 2018 at 8:30 PM

#lifegoals

goodguy5

omg that's delightful

@SPavel thanks for all the ..... Karma? w/e SE calls it

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